Wednesday, March 29, 2017

The
first book in the new Cole McCade: After Dark erotica imprint; a
darkly haunting erotica with the taboo appeal of V.C. Andrews.

"If
the romantic character study is a genre, this fascinating
contemporary novel is its exemplar." - Publishers Weekly

There's
something wrong with Leigh.

She's
known it her whole life. She knows it every time she spreads her
legs. Every time she begs for the pain, the pleasure, the heat of a
hard man driving deep inside. She's a slave to her own twisted
lusts--and it's eating her alive. She loves it. She craves it. Sex is
her drug, and she's always chasing her next fix. But nothing can
satisfy her addiction, not even the nameless men she uses and tosses
aside. No one's ever given her what she truly needs.

Until
Gabriel Hart.

Cold.
Controlled. Impenetrable. Ex-Marine Gabriel Hart isn't the kind of
man to come running when Leigh crooks her pretty little finger. She
loathes him. She hungers for him. He's the only one who understands
how broken she is, and just what it takes to satisfy the emptiness
inside. But Gabriel won't settle for just one night. He wants to
claim her, keep her, make her forever his. Together they are the
lost, the ruined, the darkness at the heart of Crow City.

But
Leigh has a darkness of her own. A predator stalking through her
past--one she'll do anything to escape.

Even
if it means running from the one man who could love her...and leaving
behind something more precious to her than life itself.

Reconnect
with Gabriel, Gary, Maxi, and Crow City in this companion novella
telling the story of THE LOST‘s Gabriel Hart before Leigh entered
his life – and get a sneak preview of the sinister Priest, hero of
THE FOUND.

Gabriel
Hart is a broken man.

And
everyone close to him dies.

His
military unit. His sister. His parents. Everyone he’s come to care
for has been taken from him, leaving him with nothing but a crippling
war injury, a Vicodin addiction, and a scraggly, chewed-up rag of a
cat. It’s enough to make anyone want to check out. And when he
holds his service pistol in his hand and presses it against his
temple, for the first time in a long time the world feels right.

But
he’s not as alone as he thinks. And when grizzled bar owner Gary
challenges him to honor his sister’s memory by repairing her
houseboat before he gives up on life, he discovers she left more for
him than her belongings. And her letters lead him on a trail through
discovering himself, discovering what he truly wants…and
discovering that he has the strength to choose his own path.

Witness
to a murder. Kidnapped by a monster. Life hanging on a whim. Willow
Armitage’s world was already falling apart; between getting fired
and caring for her chronically ill father, she’s had little room
for anything but survival. But that survival hangs in the balance the
night she stumbles into a back alley – and watches a stranger die
at the hands of the most beautiful man she’s ever seen.

For
it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul. – Leviticus
17:11

Before
he was a mysterious, silent killer stalking the streets of Crow City,
the strange man known as Priest (THE FOUND, Crow City #2) was a lost
and broken soul—and part of Willow Armitage’s world in ways she
could never have imagined. Shattered by the Afghanistan War, left
with no companions other than fellow survivor Gabriel Hart (THE LOST,
Crow City #1), ex-Marine Priest turns to his lost faith for answers
when his life has lost all meaning…but in searching for his God, he
finds a new religion. A religion of blood. Of pain.

Of
vengeance.

And
from that religion rises a mission to replace everything he had lost,
to set right just a few of the small wrongs in the world…and to
ease the constant bleeding of his broken heart, filled with sins
without number.

Revisit
Crow City and meet Priest as he was before the fateful night that
brought him into Willow’s life…and reconnect with beloved names
and faces as we discover what—and who—set him on his dark and
merciless path.

Ever
since a ghost from his past kidnapped his niece, Willow (THE FOUND,
Crow City #2), Wally’s life has been nothing but grief, turmoil,
and loss. With no idea if Willow is dead or alive, Wally’s only
comfort is in caring for his grieving brother-in-law and Willow’s
father, Joseph Armitage. For the past twenty years, Wally has never
hoped to be anything but the backdrop to Joseph’s life; between
marrying Wally’s sister and decades of mistakes building walls of
enmity and resentment between them, Joseph has been firmly cemented
in Wally’s mind as unattainable.

But
the pain of Willow’s loss forces them to face the demons sleeping
between them, find common ground—and more. Together, they explore
mutual grief. Shared memories. Quiet respect. Warmth. Camaraderie.
The joy of learning to live again.

And
an unspoken attraction, buried beneath the scars of hurtful words and
terrible missteps.

Yet
even as they work through the thorns and tangles of old wounds,
Joseph has his own struggles to face. The struggle to leave his
ex-wife in the past. To let his daughter go. And to trust Wally to
love him, to see him as more than just his multiple sclerosis, when
so many have treated him as less than a man. The only way forward for
them both is forgiveness. Trust.

And
a second chance to discover what it means, to truly be in love.

Note:
This novel, while a standalone, follows in the aftermath of the
events of THE FOUND (Crow City #2), and ties in to the events of THE
SAVED (Crow City #2.5), which detail--respectively--the events of
Willow's kidnapping and Walford’s prior relationship with her
kidnapper, Vincent Manion.

Hi.
I’m Cole. Xen. Whatever you want to call me; both are true, and
both are lies. My pen names are multitudes, my nicknames legion.
Tall, bi/queer, introverted, author, and of a brown-ish persuasion
made up of various flavors of Black, Asian, and Native American. I’m
cuter than Hello Kitty, more bitter than the blackest coffee, and
able to trip over cats in a single half-asleep lurch; I’m what
happens when a Broody Antihero and a Manic Pixie Dream Boy fight to
the death, and someone builds a person from the scraps left behind.
Beardless, I look like the uke in every yaoi manga in existence;
bearded or not, I sound like Barry White. About half my time is spent
as a corporate writer, and the other half riding a train of WTFery
that sometimes results in a finished book. Romance, erotica, sci-fi,
horror, paranormal; LGBTQIA and cishet; diverse settings and diverse
characters from a diverse author.

Sometimes
I shout about things on the internet. Usually intersectional feminism
and marginalized voices, and whomever’s punching down in those
directions today. Sometimes human sociology, the psychology of sex
and gender, and my own gender non-conforming arse (he/him, by the
way). Sometimes I get really mad at Stephen Hawking and nerd out all
over the place about hairy black holes, and believe it or not, that’s
not a terrible pun or even worse innuendo.

That’s
it. I’m a huge dork. My humor’s so dry it could empty oceans. I’m
a native Southerner from the New Orleans area with zero Southern
accent; I’m a mess of multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multi-lingual
influences; I have two cats. I wake up at daft hours of the morning
to go running. I crochet terrible, lumpy things that never really
turn into anything. I’m older than you think I look. I’m much
more shy than my fury makes me sound (signifying gods only know what,
but probably nothing). Recently I decided, at 36, that I needed to
restart my life and move cross-country, so I tossed 75% of my
possessions in the trash and randomly trucked it to Seattle. I’m in
love with books and music and technology, and they war with each
other for dominance and sometimes come together in a beautiful
confluence. Most of the physical books I own are strange, obscure,
out of print, overseas imports, or any combination of the four. Most
of the physical books I used to own were destroyed in Hurricane
Katrina, and have been replaced with the infinite library on my Nook.
My wallet has a dangerous attraction to anything with pages; it
flirts and teases and gives its all, until there’s nothing left but
emptiness and ruin.

There
will always be things you don’t know, and I won’t tell.

But
ask me late at night over live music in a seedy bar, and you might
just get an honest answer.

Welcome to Sunset Bay, where the days are hot and the nights even hotter...

Katrina Caldwell loves her job managing the spa at the tropical Sunset Bay beach resort. One of the many perks is getting to work for hotter than hot Brandon Jacobs. She knows it's a mistake to let herself fall for him—he's made it clear that he's all business. But every time she's near him, he makes her feel things she thought she'd never feel again.

Brandon doesn't have time for dating. Every bit of energy he has goes into the resort he's worked hard to transform into the greatest vacation destination around, and Katrina is a temptation he just can't indulge—even if he can't get her off his mind.

The closer they get, the harder it is to avoid their undeniable chemistry. When it becomes too much to resist, Brandon makes Kat an offer—one she knows will only lead to heartache. Can she give in to her desires and still keep her heart intact?

Christine Kingsley is the author of sweet and sassy contemporary romance. Her Willow Valley and Sunset Bay series are known for their compelling blend of heat and heart. When she’s not dreaming up her next love story, she’s wrangling her three kids or planning her next escape to the beach.

Get a taste of Christine’s sexy, heartwarming books by grabbing a free copy of Sunset Kisses at www.christinekingsley.com/yourfreebook and connect with her on social media:

When hopelessness and lust collides, how do you give life to a heart that sings to you like no other?

Disillusioned with his own kind and living among humans, powerful warlock Stellan Kierkegaard encounters his foretold soulmate in the ailing Leilani Gibson.

Together, they’re prophesied to knit dark and light covens to lead the Caster world. Yet how can this be when she is, by every indication, mortal?

Growing up, L.V. Lewis wanted to be an internationally known rock star, but unfortunately, lived in the wrong part of the country to pursue that career (and neither American Idol nor The Voice were available then). An early love for the written word gave her the plan B she sought. Now she pens romance novels that let her live vicariously through rock stars and other fascinating archetypes.

I am a stay at home mom, who loves to read and write clean
historical romance. I enjoy thinking back to a simpler time, a time when men
and women were true heroes. I also believe that a good romance can be told
without needing to know all of the details;)

All of my stories will tell of people who find true love, and
who find their happy ever after. Sometimes the road might be rocky, but that
makes it all worthwhile!

Cora left England for a new life in America as a mail order
bride - only to find the man she’s come to marry has been killed in a gunfight.
She has a sister in Kansas, but how can she get there?

Jesse needs this job driving cattle to Kansas so he can marry
the woman who’s given him an ultimatum - buy land and settle down, or she’ll
marry someone who will.

But, his cook’s been killed in the same gunfight, leaving him
without anyone to drive the chuckwagon. His right hand man, an old cowboy with
a soft heart, has a solution for both Cora and Jesse - one he might not like.

Dressed as a boy, Cora heads off with a team of cowboys, led by
a man who isn’t happy about her being there. Kansas is a long way away…and a
lot can happen before they get there.

A mom, who loves nothing more than
spending time with my family. I prefer
the quiet of living in a small town than being in a city. I’ve always loved to read, and being at home
with a good book is just as exciting to me as traveling the world.

2. What do you love most in the
world?

I love my family. I grew up around all of my grandparents, my
aunts, uncles and cousins. And I have a
sister and two brothers, who all still live in the same town with their families. My girls get to grow up knowing everyone, and
see the importance of family above anything else. Being able to just do things on a regular
basis with my family is truly the thing I love most in the world.

3. What do you fear most?

This is a tough one. I have some fears, but I think the one that
gets me the most is just that my kids won’t be happy. All I hope for them is that they find
happiness, and never have to face life with worry. When I went through treatments for breast
cancer, I felt so bad that they were having to deal with that at such a young
age. I wish I could take that fear away
from them, and show them to grab life and just be happy, no matter what
happens.

4. What is your largest unfulfilled
dream, and what are you doing to reach it?

Well, it had always been to write a
book, but since that’s been done, my largest unfulfilled dream now is to earn
enough money for my husband to be able to give up truck driving. I want the kids to have both parents home
regularly, and he’s worked hard to allow me to be a stay at home mom when the
kids were small. I’d like to pay that
back.

5. What is the hardest thing you've
ever done?

The hardest thing I’ve ever done was
say goodbye to my grandparents. I grew
up with them all close to me, and they were a huge part of my life. I was with each of them when they passed, and
each time, having to let them go was the hardest thing for me to do. But, after all they’d done for me over the
years, I knew I had to be there when they needed me.

6. Now that we've gotten to know
each other, tell me a story. It can be long or short. From your childhood or
last week. Funny, sad, or somewhere in between. Just make sure it's yours.
What's your story?

My story…well, I decided after I had
cancer that I didn’t want that to be what defined me. I didn’t want that to be what people thought
when they saw me. I get told all the
time that people actually forgot I had it.
It was a horrible time of my life, but I’ve moved past it and now try to
just stay positive. It helped me to
realize what was important, and that nothing is ever guaranteed in life. So, I took a chance and started writing—the
thing I’d always wanted to do but was too afraid to even try. And, I’m not going to let myself say “someday
I’ll do that” anymore. If there’s a way
to do it now, and it’s something I want, I’m going to do it. And I want to teach my kids to do the same
thing.

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